


voulez-vous

by ephemeralgrime



Category: Ghost (Sweden Band)
Genre: Cardinal Copia is Not Papa Nihil's Son, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Getting Together, Holidays, Jealousy, Light Bondage, M/M, Misunderstandings, Porn with Feelings, Teasing, but it's chill in fiction, but like a very very low-stakes amount of jealousy and misunderstanding, maybe don’t let your boss who is the CEO of Satan Inc tie you up on your first date irl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:00:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28352061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ephemeralgrime/pseuds/ephemeralgrime
Summary: “So,” Copia says. “You want me to protect you from your legions of nubile followers."“They are relentless,” Papa agrees somberly. He places a hand on Copia’s shoulder, fixing him with that mismatched stare. “Please say yes.”One night. One favor. What could go wrong?
Relationships: Cardinal Copia/Papa Emeritus III
Comments: 53
Kudos: 86
Collections: Ghost BC Gift Exchange 2020





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> written for the ghost winter gift exchange. for meliorate22, who wanted papa iii being très romantique, porn with feelings, and a little bondage for the holidays. i hope you enjoy! i had a blast writing it.
> 
> title from the abba song, obvs. forgive the festivus-style "winter celebration" - i didn't trust myself to do Yule right and i didn't figure a bunch of satanists would celebrate christmas.
> 
> tenderly beta'd by the radiant [@backwards-blackbird](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Backwards_Blackbird/works), without whom i would drown in a sea of typos. go read her fic! and special thanks to [@funnefatale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/funnefatale) for the hours of sprinting & cheerleading despite her 0 knowledge of ghost. read her fic too!
> 
> please note that this was posted in December 2020, in case you-know-who does you-know-what with the canon. cheers!

“Busy, Cardinal?”

Copia almost loses his footing on the ladder at the sound of Papa’s voice. He startles, throwing out a hand to brace himself on the edge of the roof and inhaling enough cold winter air to make him cough. The overall effect is rather inelegant. 

Aether looks up sharply from where he’s kneeling nearby, but Copia waves him off, climbing down the rungs as soon as his pulse returns to something approaching normal. 

“Yes, Papa?” Copia asks as he arrives back on flat ground, briskly wiping slush off his coat. 

“I said, _‘Busy, Cardinal?’_ ” Papa says pleasantly, in the exact same tone. It’s started to snow a little, and he’s all bundled up in his black wool and leather, but his ears look very pink. Probably his nose, as well, if it wasn’t painted. He’s got something in his hands, too. Closer examination reveals a portable cup carrier with four paper cups of something hot and steaming.

What Copia wants to say is _Obviously_ , but his schedule has a bad habit of clearing itself rather spontaneously when Papa is involved, so what he says is: “No, not busy. Good afternoon, Papa.”

Papa waves his hand dismissively, sloshing the contents of one of the cups he’s holding in the process. It spatters a little on the snow. “So formal. Are you writing an email?” He cranes his neck up higher where the other ghouls are puttering around on the roof. “You, too! Come down! Mandatory fifteen minute religious holiday.” 

Aether and Ifrit descend and gratefully accept their cups. Copia takes one for himself, but he doesn’t drink quite yet. It seems like this might be a bribe, and he didn’t get this far in life by not checking a gift for strings first before accepting. 

“It looks nice,” Papa says approvingly, nodding at the walkway. “It’ll look even nicer at night, all lit up.” 

Copia takes a minute to look, too. He’d spent the better part of this afternoon supervising a few of the ghouls stringing lights over the covered walkway of the main courtyard. But Copia’s never been very good at giving up control, and _supervising_ had actually meant that he’d done a third of it himself, taking the charmed lights passed to him by the ghouls and attaching them by hand along the scaffolding. It made the joints of his fingers ache, but in a way that felt _good_. Purposeful. Copia finds that the further he winds his way up the rickety staircase of the church’s senior leadership, the less actual _work_ he does. Sometimes it’s nice to actually get his hands dirty for a change. 

Papa catches him staring a little too closely. “Did you do this yourself, Cardinal?”

“A bit. We split it up.” Copia admits. He has to shield his eyes from the sun as he looks up higher, letting his eyes reach the severe peaks of the roofline of the abbey several stories away. “It feels good to do something myself. Honest work, and all that.”

Papa clicks his tongue in disapproval. “You do too much work. You need to enjoy the holidays too, Cardinal. Someone needs to tie you up so you can relax.”

Aether chokes on his cider. Ifrit pounds him on the back while he splutters. Copia hopes he can blame his flush on the cold. 

“You do that on purpose.” Copia points at him suspiciously. 

“I do,” Papa agrees cheerfully, tipping his cup back for a drink. “Always so accusatory, Cardinal. But I have nothing to hide. I’m just a simple man who likes tormenting his ghouls.”

Copia slips off a glove and puts it in his pocket so he can feel the wet warmth of the cup against his bare hand. The air outside is so cold that it makes his nails ache. “And certain Cardinals.” 

“Just the one.” Papa tucks the cardboard drink holder under his arm and cups his gloved hands against his mouth, breathing into them to warm his nose. He’s wearing the ones without the claws, Copia observes with some disappointment, watching his breath ghost around his mouth. When he brings his hands back down, Copia notices a smudge on the black paint on the tip of his nose. He elects not to mention it.

“It’s too fucking cold to be outside. Follow me to my quarters? Let’s talk about the budget.” Papa waves Copia towards him as he starts for the door. Copia toasts the ghouls goodbye with his cup and follows him.

“Let’s start with the paper cups, then. Wasteful,” Copia says as Papa shoulders the door open for them. Warm, dry air that smells like baking bread wafts around them, fragrant and heavy. The kitchen staff must be working overtime already. Copia takes a sip, then coughs in surprise. “And _spiked_. Trade with me.”

“It warms the extremities. You looked cold from my window,” Papa says defensively, but he’s already obediently passing Copia the other cup. 

They carry on this way as they walk to Papa’s quarters. The running cost of the winter festivities is creeping towards the top of the budget, and Sister Imperator wants them to keep a closer eye on any frivolous spending. For all its exaltation of wanton revelry, the church _does_ need to keep the lights and the heat on after all, or would they prefer to fuck each other in the dark and cold next to the empty coffers?

“Sister did _not_ say that.” Copia shrugs off his scarf and jacket and hangs them on a peg by the door. 

“It was _implied_ ,” Papa says, checking his reflection in a mirror by the entryway. He turns his head from side to side, assessing. His breath fogs the mirror. “Cardinal, why didn’t you tell me I had a smudge?” 

Copia considers several answers of varying sincerity before he finally settles on one. “I like to see you humbled,” he says lightly. 

Copia lays his gloves carefully next to Papa’s untidy pile before he moves to the living room. From there, he watches Papa rummage in his opulent dresser drawer for his paint, then delicately dab black pigment onto his nose. It reminds Copia a little of his mother, carefully curling her hair at her vanity.

“Anyway, I told her there was nothing to worry about with her golden boy managing things.” Papa holds a hand mirror at arm’s length, assessing. Copia watches his reflection sigh. “I’ll just be happy when it’s over.” 

“You? Not excited about a party?” Copia lets himself sink into the chaise lounge, watching Papa fidget his way across his quarters, like he can’t bear to stand still. He’s like this with everything, even sermons. He never stops moving until it’s over, and even then, Copia sometimes watches his hands curl and flex by his sides, like a dog twitching in its sleep, dreaming of running. 

Papa’s fussing with the kettle now, and Copia hears the tap cough and splatter into the pot before he answers. “All those people trying to impress me,” he says, setting it on the stove. “And then- and then I have to pretend not to notice that they’re trying to impress me, and I have to be charming, I have to be _gracious-_ ”

“Ah. Hard times, indeed.”

“Oh, shut up, it’s exhausting.” He makes his way to the lounge and sits down next to Copia. “You spend so much time trying to look like you’re having fun that it’s actually miserable.” He pats Copia’s leg fondly. “This is why I like you so much, Cardinal. You don’t care what I think.”

This is mildly hilarious, because Copia _does_ care what Papa thinks. Quite a lot, in fact. It’s just that the caring is so often outweighed by exasperation—or, if Copia permits himself to acknowledge it, and he _rarely_ does, something approaching adoration—that it tends to get lost in the shuffle. 

Unfortunately for Copia and his veneer of sensible disdain, he finds Papa terribly charming. Then again, there’s no one on this Earth or Below he’s found yet who doesn’t, except for maybe Imperator, who seems to be a living inoculation against his particular brand of roguish mischief. 

Papa’s like smoke—expanding to fill the shape of whatever room he’s in. It makes him feel vast and terrifying at the pulpit, huge in a way that Copia can’t reconcile with the man in front of him now. That's why it’s nice to spend time here: in his elaborate but untidy quarters, discussing the Q4 budget with a used mug on the table in front of him. A scaled-down version. Someone who Copia can spend time with and not feel tamped-down desire closing in around him like a fist around his throat. 

Well, most of the time, anyway. 

“Sugar in your tea?” Papa calls from the kitchen. Copia startles back to himself. 

“Yes, please. Thank you,” he says, accepting the mug from Papa with some suspicion when he walks back to the living room. “That’s two seasonal beverages in the last half hour. I think you’re about to ask me for a favor.” 

“Am I so obvious, Cardinal?”

“When have you ever been anything _but_ obvious?" 

Papa pulls a face, then smooths the hair around his temples back, which he only does when he’s nervous. This instantly has the effect of making _Copia_ nervous, because he can’t possibly figure what Papa, of all people,would have to be anxious about.

Papa takes his hand in his very best facsimile of gentlemanly behavior. “Come with me. To the winter celebration. Save your Papa from boredom.” He pauses for a moment, then adds as an afterthought: “Please.”

Copia almost laughs. “I thought you were going to ask for more help with the planning. You want me to _go_ with you?” 

“Cardinal, please. I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather spend the night with.”

Copia rolls his eyes. The drinks, the walk, this conspicuously nonchalant conversation, the entire reason that Papa plucked him off the ladder in the first place: all for an excuse not to go to a party alone. 

“And what’s in it for me?” Copia asks, wriggling his hand out of Papa’s grip and picking up his mug. 

He thinks he sees Papa make a face, but it’s possible it’s just the paint. It always makes him look a little more dour than he actually is. At least, that’s what Copia _thinks_ , because it’s not like he’s ever seen him without it.

“You mean besides your Papa’s enthralling company?”

“Surely there’s more than a few Siblings who would enjoy that.” 

“Oh, there’s no need to be insulting. They _all_ would. And I’d show them a good time.” He’s pressing the hair by his temples flat again, though it hasn’t moved. “But I’d be miserable.” 

Copia feels a little prickle of something close to annoyance that Papa had just _assumed_ he’d say yes. He’s not his on-call entertainment, and Rent-a-Copia only runs so many hours a day. 

And if he’s being honest, he also feels a little bruised that Papa assumed he didn’t already have a date, even if he happened to be right, in this case. He’s not an Emeritus brother, but he does all right for himself, thanks very much. Plus, the idea of being Papa’s date without _really_ being Papa’s date sounds like a level of self-flagellation that even Copia isn’t ready for.

He steeps in his annoyance like the tea on the stove, saying nothing. Papa makes an exasperated sound. 

“I have to say, I didn’t think this would be such a hard sell,” he says, lying back against the cushions glumly. 

Copia sighs as he stands up, walking over to the window and looking over the grounds for something to do, because this conversation is making him feel fidgety in ways he can’t quite figure out. 

It’s cold, even through the window, and the landscape is white and frosted all the way to the horizon. He can see the small shapes of what looks like Aether, Alpha, and someone short—maybe Dewdrop or Mist—on the ground level beneath him. They’re throwing fistfuls of snow at each other; the lights abandoned in a box next to them. The sun’s starting to set, and if he squints, Copia can just start to see the yellow blush of lights from the afternoon’s work in the courtyard. They _will_ look lovely at night, just like Papa said. 

When Copia first started assisting Nihil, it immediately became apparent that the job came with a considerable amount of baggage, all of it Emeritus-shaped. Copia is not, historically speaking, good at saying no to the Emeritus family, and he likes Papa’s company with a fierceness that he seems to spend most of his free time trying to not examine too closely. 

The doctrine of the church, he’s learned, is mostly about saying _yes_. Casting off the shame your oppressive culture saddled you with and dancing naked with the devil—metaphorically, of course. Most of the time.

But being an Emeritus means that Papa never had any shame to begin with. Nothing to cast off; just _Yes_ all the way down. It doesn’t sound like a bad way to live.

Maybe it's not such a bad thing to get a contact high, Copia thinks. Just for the night. Like standing outside a kitchen and letting yourself smell all the wonderful things cooking, but not being able to taste anything. Maybe saying _yes_ to Papa, just this once, is better than nothing at all. 

Papa’s joined him at the window. Copia exhales and turns to him. 

“So,” Copia says. “You want me to protect you from your legions of nubile followers." 

“They _are_ relentless,” Papa agrees somberly. He places a hand on Copia’s shoulder, fixing him with that mismatched stare. “Please say yes.”

“One dance.” Copia says, holding up a finger, just so there’s no misunderstanding.

“One dance,” Papa agrees, grinning like mad. “ _And_ you stay on my arm for the night.” 

“Okay, but—”

“Ah, but I believe you already agreed, Cardinal,” Papa scolds brightly, taking his arm and leading him back to the couch. “It’s in poor taste to discuss a contract after it’s been signed. Now. We have a budget to discuss.”

Copia lets himself be steered, wondering who exactly is at the wheel here.

***

For the next week, Copia has his hands too full of invoices and hors d'oeuvres menus to examine Papa’s invitation too closely. It sits in the corner of his mind like a specter, patiently waiting for his hands to be idle enough to take a front-row seat in his brain. If he intentionally volunteers to help the Earth ghouls trim the hedges after dinner until he’s so exhausted that he’s asleep before his head hits the pillow at night, well. That’s between him and his specter.

But two days before the festivities, he gets a package delivered to his quarters, which is somewhat more difficult to ignore. 

He stoops to collect if off the threshold, vaguely bewildered. It’s a black rectangular box, glossy and expensive-looking, tied with a black silk ribbon. He shoulders the door closed and sets the box on his dining room table, slipping off a glove to rub the soft ribbon between his bare fingers. 

When he slides off the top, there’s a small white card on top of what looks like folded black fabric. The handwriting is small and cramped, and he has to fumble for his reading glasses to make it out.

_Cardinal,_

_I thought it best if we matched._

_Terzo._

He picks up the fabric and spreads it out over the table. It’s a crisply tailored suit—black, like his formal suit when he doesn’t have to wear his cassock, but when he looks closer, he can see that the waistcoat is actually a dark, glossy purple. It’s late, and the living room lamp has already been switched off, but the lights strung across his window outside cast the room in a dim glow. 

The fabric shimmers, iridescent and beautiful, like the shell of a beetle. 

Upon further inspection, the buttons are gold, and so is the stitching on the grucifix next to the lapel. All of Papa’s colors. He must have sweet-talked the abbey tailor within an inch of his life to have it made on such short notice. 

It’s an awful lot of work for a fake date, but Copia can’t deny that it’s lovely. Papa likes to cut a dramatic figure, and if he’s pretending to be his date du jour, he needs to look the part, too. It just makes sense.

If he slips off his other glove and slides his fingers against the fine seams at the shoulders and the cool silk lining, maybe he can blame it on inspecting its craftsmanship. 

If he presses his face to the collar and inhales a little, just to see if it smells like Papa, perhaps he has less of an excuse. 

He tucks the card into his pocket as he carries the suit to his bedroom to hang it up before it wrinkles. 

_Terzo_. 

***

On the crisp, cold night of the winter celebration, Copia walks alone to Papa’s quarters. 

Papa had offered to meet Copia at his door, but Papa’s the kind of man who would be late to his own funeral. Copia had declined in the interest of getting there before midnight, opting instead to meet Papa and walk there together.

The trip there is quiet and strange. Copia feels exposed somehow, even through three layers of conspicuously tailored menswear. Papa must have somehow gotten his exact measurements, because the fit of the suit is meticulous. He’d privately marveled at it the night before, standing in front of his mirror in his bare feet, turning left and right, watching it glint in the light. 

It’s tight. Flared around the ankles, just like he prefers. It’s like he ordered it himself. Something about Papa choosing a suit that fits him so closely feels a little intimate, like it’s _his_ gloved hand pressing against Copia’s back instead of purple silk so soft and fine it feels like water.

The back of his neck is suddenly hot. He walks a bit more briskly so that he can have something to pin the blame on. 

Usually, this sort of thing calls for a formal entrance. Masked followers chanting, a few candles, maybe even a little bloodletting—the works. But Papa prefers what he likes to call a _conspicuously inconspicuous_ arrival: squeezing his way through the crowd at the last minute like the rockstar stereotype he is. Enter Copia, walking to his quarters, trying not to let the memory of secondary school dances nip at his heels too closely.

He’s already rehearsing what he’ll have to say to Papa to get him to hurry up, but when he reaches the top of the private staircase that leads to the papal quarters, he finds that Papa’s already there in his suit, sitting on the railing, looking artfully bored.

“As I live and breathe. You’re ready on time.”

Papa examines his nail beds in a very intentional sort of way. “Always with the _j’accuse_ , Cardinal. I can revoke this invitation at any time, you know.” 

He hops down from the railing and takes his time descending the staircase, making a show of brushing off his jacket, which is precisely when Copia notices that it’s not the one he usually wears. It’s the same cut; high-collared and fashionable, with large gleaming buttons, but it’s a dark, glossy purple. 

The same color as Copia’s waistcoat, with the same gold accents. 

He can’t look at the suit for too long, because he’ll start seeing _Terzo_ inked on cream-colored paper like some handwritten ghost of Christmas past. He points at Papa’s chest instead. Best to stick to well-trod ground.

“I’m calling your bluff,” he says. They start the short walk to the main hall. Even here, the air smells like scented candles and rosemary. Winter scents. “You’d be torn to shreds by your nubile flock, and Sister would learn blood magic to summon you back from Hell to pay for the biohazard cleanup.” 

Papa laughs, taking Copia’s arm and tucking it easily into his own. “What a speech, Cardinal. Did you think of that on the walk over?” He waves coquettishly at a Brother as they stride past him. The halls are lit warmly for the occasion, and the candlelight catches the gold nails on his gloves. Copia watches the Brother do a double-take before shyly waving back. Conspicuously inconspicuous indeed. 

“For the record, Cardinal, I prefer to think that I’ve chosen to show up earlier than expected. It just so happens to be the time listed on those charming invitations you sent out.” He shakes out that perfect hair a little. “This job’s mostly PR, you know.”

“I thought it was mostly excess. And virgins.”

“It’s not a zero-sum game, Cardinal,” he says archly. “It can be all those things.” His grip on Copia’s arm is tight and warm, even through the layers of fabric separating them. “The gold lettering on the invitations was a nice touch, by the way. Was that a ghoul charm?” 

Copia permits himself to preen, just a little. This is the kind of thing he’s best at: the minutiae that makes something _great_ instead of good. Most people don’t notice the work between the seams. “Yes. The Earth ghouls are very talented with precious metals. And it is your color, after all.”

“And yours, too, tonight.” 

Copia feels his stomach do something that feels anatomically improbable and completely embarrassing. “It’s beautiful work. Thank you. But I really didn’t need a new suit. I could’ve worn the black one.”

The black shine of Papa’s hair looks almost purple under the glow of the candles as they walk. It reminds Copia of a bird’s wing, all those fine, dark strands resolving into something strange and beautiful.

“But I didn’t want you to wear _the black one_. I’m not wearing the black one. It’s a special occasion!” When Copia doesn’t respond, Papa sighs in exasperation. Copia looks on as he pinches the bridge of his nose between his gloved fingers, minding the nails. 

“You’re not very good at self-indulgence, Cardinal. I thought I’d make it a little easier for you.” The hallway’s starting to get more crowded now as the rest of the clergy files in around them, making their way to the celebration. Papa does a little half-bow at a Sister as they walk. She flushes pink and curtsies rather abruptly back at him, almost knocking over her date. “A gift from someone else is easier to accept than a gift to yourself. I’m just priming the pump for you a little.”

“Okay, that’s it. I’m limiting you to one innuendo per minute.”

Now it’s Papa’s turn to point at him. “This is _exactly_ what I’m talking about, Cardinal. No! _J’accuse!_ You need to live a little! You’re going to have a good time, or I’m going to—” 

It’s out of Copia’s mouth before he can stop himself. “What, tie me up and force me to?” 

Papa laughs, full-throated and utterly delighted. “Your words this time, Cardinal. Not mine.”

The open archway to the main hall is visible ahead of them now, warmly lit by the enchanted lights the ghouls had spent long hours stringing up. Copia can just see the tips of the charmed firefly bushes brought in from the greenhouse, peeking verdant and shining through through the crowd already starting to form. Everything’s in place. His work’s paid off, as it often does.

The corridor around them gets louder and warmer and more crowded until they finally have to peel apart and weave their way one-by-one through black-robed bodies that are already flushed and well on their way to tipsy. Pulled along by the tether of Papa’s hand, Copia sees flashes of bare legs and rolled-up sleeves, collarbones and cleavage, all mottled from the cold walk from the dormitories to the main hall.

All around them, there’s the smell of roasted meat and baking bread, warm bodies and alcohol, and the cool, sweet air coming from a window cracked nearby. If he squints, he can _just_ make out what looks like a Brother pressed up against one of the Earth ghouls on a dim windowsill across the hall. The ghoul’s horns hit the windowpane as he tips his head back in furtive pleasure. 

It’s a holiday, all right. 

In a gap between bodies, he watches as Papa pivots away from him, leaning over to pluck two narrow glasses off a nearby server’s tray without missing a beat. Siblings around them start to murmur in excitement as they notice who’s suddenly appeared in their midst, and Papa has to raise his voice to be heard when he speaks next.

“Sometimes, you just need a little push. All things come with practice, Cardinal.” He hands Copia his glass, then taps them together with a _clink_. 

“To a little self-indulgence,” he toasts, and Copia watches the tanned line of his throat as he swallows. 


	2. II

This has always been Copia’s favorite time of year, the stress of planning and fake dates notwithstanding.

It’s nothing like the Christmases of his childhood, with their empty pews and aching knees and sad, skinny boys sagging dead from crosses. He’s spent half his life at the abbey now—maybe a little more, depending when you start counting—but even after all this time, it still manages to unmoor him a little just how _warm_ the end of the year is. 

Winter just has a way of affirming him. It feels a little bit like coming home and only realizing how much you’ve changed by the things that are different. Almost like his old life is a poorly-fitted sweater, but he can never remember just how bad the stitches are until he holds it up in front of a mirror.

Here, there’s good food and easy laughter, dancing and affection freely given, and the perpetual sense of entering a warm room after being bundled up in the cold. Maybe the silhouettes of the crowd are distinctly more horned than he would have expected in a winter tableau, but he’s getting better at being less surprised. 

He and Papa had walked in together, and Papa had led a brief, lively sermon to the crowd— _Just enough to get the blood pumping, Cardinal, no need to sit down_ —and then the night had started up in earnest. Ice sculptures carved by the water ghouls stand glistening and imposing at the hall’s corners, bewitched not to melt until the morning. Food and garlands of flowers from the greenhouse are heaped on a long banquet table, charmed by the fire ghouls to stay warm all night. On a small stage near the middle of the hall, Air ghouls pull sound from string instruments without touching them. 

Eat, drink, be merry. Even the Catholics couldn’t find a way to refute that one. 

But Papa wasn’t wrong about the small talk. Copia might be Imperator’s golden boy, but Papa’s the star of the night. They can’t have a moment to themselves without a Sibling or a Deacon coming up, trying to rub elbows. 

Or, Copia thinks with some annoyance, trying to rub something _else_. 

“Imagine their faces when they find out you didn’t hang the moon,” Copia says under his breath, watching another Sibling walk away from them with a spring in her step, not so much in defeat as in deferred opportunity. At least she didn’t stick her tongue through the V of her fingers, like the Brother before her. Copia spears an olive with his fork with more force than strictly necessary.

“How fortunate I am to have you to ground me, Cardinal.” Papa squeezes his shoulder, then cranes his neck toward the Emeritus table, which is empty, save for a bleary-looking Nihil. “I do wish my brother would take some of the pressure off, though.” 

He has to mean Secondo, because Copia knows full well that Primo doesn’t like crowds when he’s not onstage. He’s probably reading a book in the library. Or bending a Sister over an antique table in said library. There’s not really a lot of in between with him. 

Secondo had been there for the sermon, looking severe and regal in a trim black suit, but he’d disappeared as soon as the servers appeared, which had irked Copia. Papa might be eternally late, but at least he’s never left anything early. Copia hadn’t realized how much he’d been counting on a few extra Emeritus brothers to dilute the waters until it had been just him and Papa against the entire congregation. 

Copia reminds himself that this was, of course, the point of this entire invitation. A Copia-shaped shield against the church’s damp-eyed, ample-bosomed masses. He stabs another olive.

“Cardinal, hold my drink,” Papa says suddenly, letting one hand rest at the small of Copia’s back and pressing his glass towards him with the other. “Just for a moment. It’s an emergency.” He points across the hall. “Do you see Alpha’s hair? It looks awful. I need to tease him for it.”

He’s off in a rustle of coattails, but Copia’s not alone for long, because Sister Imperator’s approaching him now, wearing something very black and high-necked and feathered. He kisses her cheek as best he can with his hands full. 

“Sister. You’re as radiant as ever.” Her hair—or maybe a stray feather—tickles his ear as she pulls back. She smells like woodsmoke and violets, strange and familiar.

“Copia,” she says with her usual affection. “You’re... wearing purple.” Her crisply painted lips make a strange shape on her face.

Copia looks down, remembering, suddenly self-conscious. “Oh. Yes. Papa’s colors. A favor.” 

“A favor.” One arched eyebrow creeps toward her hairline. 

This is moderately distressing, because _Copia’s_ usually the one doing the whole suspicious repetition thing. It makes him a little flustered to be on the receiving end.

“Well, you know how he is. He didn’t want to come alone tonight.”

“Hmm.” She takes what seems like a deliberate sip from her glass.

“What do you mean, _hmm_?” 

“Oh, nothing. I’ve just never known him to arrive with a date before,” she says, delicately blotting her lip with her thumb. “ _Leaving_ with one, on the other hand...” 

Copia is seized by an uncontrollable urge to change the subject. “What do you think of the celebration, Sister?” he asks with somewhat more force and volume than the question requires. “The ice sculptures aren’t too much?”

She pauses mid-blot, and then her face softens a little as she smiles. She reaches a hand out slowly, intending to cup his face. The gesture is familiar, and he meets her halfway. “You did very well, Copia. I knew you would, of course.” Her hand is cool and soft against his face, which feels upsettingly warm. “But don’t show me the final invoices until tomorrow.”

Copia does a little _Yes ma’am, it’s all in here_ tapping motion against his temple as he pulls back. “I’ll have a bishop bring them by with a bloody mary.” 

She laughs, ruffling the feathers around her neck a little. They give her the impression of a sleek predatory bird. “You know me well. Looks like your date’s on his way back.” She nods over Copia’s shoulder, and then her eyebrow is creeping distressingly north again. “Enjoy your evening, Copia. But try not to get in your own way.”

Copia lets that sink in as he watches the black, angular shape of her silhouette walk away, reaching out to straighten a stray ghoul’s crooked bowtie before she returns to Nihil’s side. Copia feels about three steps behind Imperator on a good day, but tonight feels like everyone’s lapped him before he’s tied his laces. 

He’s about to turn back to look for Papa, but there’s no need, because there’s already a gloved hand snaking around his waist. Papa nestles his chin in the gap between Copia’s neck and his shoulder in greeting. 

“He let Omega cut his bangs! Can you believe that?” Papa reaches down and casually plucks a mini quiche off the plate that Copia’s holding. “Ah, did I miss our lovely Imperator? She’ll have to lecture me for some unknown slight another time.” 

Copia looks down at his hand and sees the gray imprint of Papa’s painted mouth on his glass, translucent and precise, like a thumbprint on a slide. He sets it down on an end table and turns it away from himself as Papa suddenly stiffens.

“Shit. I just made eye contact with Air.”

“You looked at _him_.” 

Papa looks at him in flat annoyance. “I didn’t think he would look back! You don’t know the depths of my suffering. He’s going to talk to me about thermal columns, I just know it.” A gloved hand settles on Copia’s shoulder. “I can’t bear to hear one more word about solar convection. Save me, Cardinal. Let’s dance.” 

Even Copia can’t wriggle his way out of this one. He takes Papa’s hand, trying to ignore how eagerly his heart jumps into this throat at the touch.

“One dance,” he says, letting himself be tugged towards the stage.

“One dance, Cardinal. I promise.”

For the second time that night, Papa leads, and Copia follows. 

***

The air ghouls are plucking something waltzy and slow, and Copia’s got one hand on Papa’s waist and the other clasped in Papa’s hand, glove-to-glove. Papa had tried to thread their fingers together at first, probably to be deliberately annoying, before Copia had stopped him. 

“Don’t lace your fingers,” Copia had corrected him, positioning their hands so they’d be clasped in sort of a perpendicular way, like how you’d hold a date’s hand if you had a nosy chaperone with you. _Leaving room for Christ,_ they’d called it. Copia doesn’t feel particularly graced by his presence tonight, but he’ll take any excuse to be a little more chaste. “If you lace your fingers, your partner can’t twirl you.” 

“I had no idea you knew how to dance, Cardinal. I would have suggested this much sooner if I knew I might be twirled.”

At some point, Papa’s other hand had crept from Copia’s shoulder to the back of his neck. He can feel the flex of Papa’s fingers near the crown of his head as he says this, like his body is incapable of not gesturing while speaking, even when otherwise occupied. 

“I did warn you, didn’t I?” Papa prompts. “About the small talk and the misery?” 

Copia inclines his head in reluctant agreement. “You did.”

“And?”

Copia stares at the bare patch of skin above Papa’s collar as they sway, because he sort of can’t _not_ look from this position. Copia privately thinks the cut of his jacket makes him look a little maritime, like all he needs to be a handsome pirate anti-hero is a tricorn hat. 

He exhales in defeat. “I hate it when you’re right.” 

Papa angles the side of his head towards him, like he can’t quite hear. “What was that? I was right? _Oh_ , _Cardinal_. Say it again, slowly this time.” 

Copia can’t point, because his hand is rather preoccupied with delivering the least distressing amount of pressure to the parabola between his waist and hip, so he narrows his eyes instead. “You’re an alley cat, you know.” 

“I’d prefer to be remembered as a hopeless romantic with a dirty mouth. But you may call me what you like, Cardinal.” 

“That title’s a little long for a tombstone, don’t you think?”

“Who says I want to be buried? I was thinking of a Viking funeral. They’d talk about it for centuries.”

“Sounds like an awful lot of paperwork for a public cremation.”

Papa laughs then, and Copia does too, trying not to stare too openly at the bare pink spot that’s appeared right in the middle of Papa’s bottom lip paint. 

“You are so _mean_ to me Cardinal. I love it. I’m so entertained.” he sighs happily. “Well, I guess I’ll just never die. Do you think I can convince Sister to learn that blood magic you mentioned now?”

“She probably mastered it decades ago.” 

“Yes, she does seem the type, doesn’t she?” He considers this for a beat. “You know, maybe a little blood magic is just what I need to restore my youthful complexion. Stave off the reaper a little longer.”

So much death on an empty stomach makes Copia feel a little ill. “You’re so morbid. No talk of the reaper until I’ve had my second drink.”

_“The door was opened, and the wind appeared...”_

“You know, I can call Air back over here any time.” 

Copia permits himself a glance over Papa’s shoulder then. A few Siblings mill around the edges of the area where ghouls and Siblings are dancing, watching them with carefully feigned disinterest. 

“Don’t look now Papa, but I think we have an audience.”

Papa looks, openly and obviously. Copia sucks his teeth in frustration. 

“Ah. Jealous onlookers.” Papa says it with the bland nonchalance of a weather observation. Cloudy with a chance of devotées.

Copia leads Papa away from the Siblings as best he can while trying to keep beat with the music. “Did Nihil have this problem too?” He thinks of Papa’s father as he knows him now, loudly unwrapping peppermints during sermons when he thinks no one can hear him and forgetting when his mic is still hot. “I’m having trouble picturing it.”

“You haven’t seen his old portraits? We need to make a trip to the archives sometime. I regret to inform you that he was very handsome. I’m sure he was beating them back with a broom.”

“Ah. The Emeritus family curse of desire.” 

“Broom sold separately,” Papa agrees gravely, then laughs. “Oh, Cardinal. I don’t get to talk like this with anyone else. Let’s make fun of my father more.” But he suddenly looks distracted as he focuses on something behind Copia. “ _Cazzo_. They won’t leave us alone, will they?”

Copia glances over his own shoulder. The group has thinned out, but there are still a few Siblings and one hopeful ghoul at the fringes of the makeshift dance floor. They all look like they’re calculating a complex math problem, like maybe with enough grit and elbow grease they can squeeze in and replace Copia before Papa notices. 

They probably could. Copia feels like his defenses have never been lower, like he’s got a big hand-painted target that says _Lovesick Idiot_ on the back of his coat. He thinks he has some idea of how sick prey animals feel under the shadow of a buzzard.

“I have an idea, Cardinal,” Papa says over his shoulder, his voice suddenly low and conspiratorial. 

“Famous last words,” Copia observes, turning back to him. “What?”

When he looks at him again, Papa’s eyes have gone dark—viscous-looking, almost. It must be hard-coded into the Emeritus bloodline, because Copia has tried to replicate this in the mirror before to no effect. He knows it well. It’s the same look they get during carnal rituals and bloodlettings. 

Copia suddenly feels his heart kick once, loudly, one big _thump_ square in the middle of his chest, like it’s taken a good look at this whole scene and has wisely decided to clock out early for the night. _Take me with you!_ he thinks silently. 

“Why don’t we give them something to look at?” Papa asks, inclining his head. Half charm, half sleaze. 

Flying on autopilot, feeling the hot puff of Papa’s breath on his cheekbone, Copia hears a much more present version of himself asking: “What did you have in mind?” 

“Well, I only have one dance. I intend to make the most out of it. They want a show? Let’s give them one.” 

Papa’s glove must have ridden up a little, because the warm, bare skin of his wrist is rubbing against Copia’s neck. The air in the room is sweet and hot, and Copia’s hand is clutching the fabric of Papa’s fine shirt with enough force to feel his knuckles ache, and then Papa’s leaning in slowly and fitting his mouth against Copia’s. 

He feels the press of his chest against Papa’s as they both lean in, pulling each other closer, pressed tighter together is really polite, even for a crowd like this. Papa’s lips part as he kisses him a little deeper, lush and sweet. 

They part. Breathe. Kiss again.

Papa’s hand creeps up higher, until his fingers are stroking the short hair at the nape of his neck. Copia can’t hear anything but his own blood pounding in his ears and the quiet, happy sound Papa makes when he lets his mouth fall open a little more.. 

It’s a nice kiss, as kisses go. Very nice, even. Someone flipping through the color-coded filing cabinet of Copia’s mind might even say it’s something close to perfect, according to _PAPA, FANTASIES ABOUT: Subsection C - Public Displays of Affection._

What a shame—what a _waste—_ that it isn’t real. 

Even as his body responds, and even as Papa strokes the back of his neck with a thumb and darts his tongue against his lip, Copia can’t feel anything but a prickling, awful emptiness, because it would be better to not have something at all than to have it as a joke. A show for a crowd that didn’t even want to watch. 

Just like that, the song is over. The ghouls set down their instruments, stretching their necks and uncurling their tails, taking a break to top off their glasses at the bar. Papa pulls back, eyes still closed for a moment, and Copia’s throat feels tight and choked with how much he wants _that_ —that quiet moment of satisfaction—to not be an act. 

They’re still pressed flush, all the way down to the waist. Something about it trips a switch in Copia, a prey animal fight-or-flight urge to escape, because if he has to endure another second of this having but not _having,_ he might be sick.

“Are they gone?” Papa asks, smiling, swiping at his upper lip with his thumb. The pink spot has grown. “I think we scared them off. Cardinal—”

But whatever he was going to say next is lost, swallowed up in the noise of the crowd. Copia’s already gone.


	3. III

How nice it would be, Copia thinks, tucked into the uncomfortable window seat off the south hallway, for someone else to be in control of his life. He feels stupid, so _incadenscently_ stupid in such a self-directed way that it makes his face burn all the way up to his hairline. He walked right into a trap that he helped set himself, because he was too proud to admit that he knew this was going to happen. 

He should have known himself well enough to say _no_ in Papa’s quarters, right from the start. He should have dumped the tea on the snow, or refused to leave the roof, or grown up a nice Catholic boy in a nice Catholic family and never befriended devils and Hellspawn to begin with.

Copia has the bizarre sensation of being jealous of _himself_ ; of the _idea_ of Copia that Papa invited to the celebration. Of the facsimile of their intimacy. Of _their_ kiss.

He lets his back lean against the cold of the window behind him, like if he makes himself uncomfortable enough, he can shake this off. Like maybe a bruised heart is something you can sober up from. He tries, without success, to ignore the distinctly tacky feeling on his lips: Papa’s paint, left on his mouth like a brand. 

Maybe he’ll be forgiven for being a poor sport in this game, because who among the clergy could have resisted? Who could survive _Papa_ being dangled so close to their face? No one could withstand that kind of torture. It feels mythological in its cruelty. Promethean, almost. 

Or is it Sisyphean? He always gets them mixed up. It’s more the endless boulder-hefting thing, and not so much the liver-eating one. 

No matter, he thinks, briskly, crazily. He’ll have plenty of time to study them in the library where he’ll live out the rest of his years in solitude until he dies in the archives, and his corpse is devoured by rats. Here lies Copia, felled by his own desire. 

He’s about to turn his face to press his cheek into the glass, maybe see how long he can keep it there until the cold starts to really sting, when he hears the lilting call of Papa’s voice behind him.

“Cardinal! I thought I lost you! I wanted to trick you into another dance.” He’s half-jogging over, his hair bouncing in stride. His voice drops off sharply when he sees Copia’s face, which must look as bad as Copia feels. “Copia. What’s wrong?”

It’s the same voice Copia heard him using on a skittish horse at the stables once, when he thought Copia was too far away to hear. Around the corner, Copia had pressed his cheek to the wood of the barn, smelling apples and wet fall leaves and the ghost of Papa’s cologne, feeling like his heart could break his sternum. It hurts, somehow, to hear it used on him now. 

Copia means to wave him off; maybe fake sick, or walk away, or pray to the Unholy Father to be called down to Hell as a favor, just this once. He hears it’s nice this time of year. He briefly entertains leaping out the window and taking his chances in the snow. 

But wearing your heart on your sleeve is a bad quality for a liar, and it all just comes tumbling out of him. 

“I’m…” Copia scrubs at his face. That kind of move’s apparently more of a bare-handed thing, because it feels extremely unsatisfying through a glove. Papa’s soft, open face, right after he kissed him, hangs in front of him like an afterimage. “I’m done. Tapping out. I’m sorry,” he says quietly.

Papa looks at him with a carefully blank expression on his face, like Copia’s an animal that will startle if he approaches too quickly. Copia curls his fisted hand so tightly that he can feel the bitten-down edges of his nails stinging bluntly through the fabric of his glove. 

“Look, I’ll be in your debt for a favor, alright? Just not this one.” Copia wants it to come out quiet and dignified. He wants to be the kind of man who can dust off his own bruised ego and get on with his evening, but his voice cracks treacherously on the first word. Goddamn it. “Just call in a pinch hitter. I’m sure you don’t need to look far to find one.”

“I won’t make you dance again, if that’s what this is about.” Papa holds up three fingers like it’s a peace offering. “Scout’s honor.” The salute falters a little, sagging sadly when Copia doesn’t respond right away.

“That’s not it. I just—” 

Copia squeezes his eyes shut briefly. He can’t tell if it’s better or worse to say this with them closed. He decides on open. If he’s walking the plank, he’ll watch it happen. “I can’t put on a show. I can’t- handle _that_. Any of that. As a joke.” He looks down at his hands. “I can’t do it if it’s not real.”

For a moment, it’s quiet between them. The muted sounds from the festivities, happy and drunken and faintly mocking, drift to them from down the hall. Someone opens the door to the outer courtyard, laughs in a high echoing screech, then falls quiet. The world carries on turning around Copia, in his own private little snowglobe of hurt feelings.

Then Papa steps forward, shaking his head back and forth slowly, disbelieving. 

“Cardinal,” Papa says. His words are clipped and precise, but somehow not entirely steady. Uncertainty sounds strange on him, like he’s a clumsy creature picking its way through rough terrain. “I don’t remember ever implying that any of this was a joke.” 

Copia almost laughs, because it’s absurd; this is all fucking _absurd_. “No, no, you—” he starts, but finds that whatever proof he was going to use is gone, yanked from underneath him like a magician’s tablecloth, except that there isn’t even a stack of inconspicuous plateware there for him to point to. He sets a hand on the windowsill, playing back the tape of the last week in his head. 

The warmth of the cider. The tender feeling of his own bruised ego as he agreed to come with Papa anyway. The suit in _his_ colors. The press of Papa’s lips against his. What was it he had thought to himself? That it was _an awful lot of work for a fake date?_

“I thought it was an act. For the night.” Copia manages, haltingly. “You said- your… your followers. I was… protecting you,” he finishes stupidly. 

“That was _banter!_ ” Papa splutters, looking as confused as Copias feels. “Flirty banter! Like we always do! I say something ridiculous, and you play the straight man, and then I say something dirty and you pretend to be offended!”

“Flirty? How was that _flirty_?”

If Papa’s face wasn’t covered by paint, it would be turning purple. “I _asked you on a date_ and _sent you a suit!_ How can you sit here and ask me how that was flirty?” 

“I… I thought that—” Copia says, feeling the foundation of this entire week turn to sand beneath his feat. “I thought you wanted to make it look convincing?” 

Papa rubs his temples, smearing paint in his wake. “ _That_ felt like the most obvious explanation for you? That this was some complex ruse? _Cardinal_.” He gestures at himself broadly, with both hands, as if to say _Look at this! This is not a complex ruse-enacting man!_ “Do you really think I’d have enough patience to do something like that?”

For some reason, that’s what finally does it. Copia blinks, feeling a thunderclap of delayed realization in his chest, one big great _zip_ all the way down to the floor. Oh. 

He places a hand to his lips, which seem to have gone a bit numb. “Well, when you put it like that.”

Papa swears under his breath, laughing in disbelief as he addresses the ground between his feet. _“Satan grant me strength.”_ His voice is uncharacteristically soft when he looks up and speaks next. “Oh, Cardinal.”

He steps into the empty space beside him and places a careful hand in the small of Copia’s back. Copia’s heart must not have checked out after all, because okay, yep, there it is, beating double-time in his chest. 

“When I asked you to come with me,” Papa says softly. “It was because I wanted you to. Was that so hard for you to believe?”

Papa was really asking him. No favors, no jokes, no strings attached. Copia had been so sure—so _unwaveringly_ sure—that it couldn’t have been sincere that he hadn’t even permitted himself to wonder what would happen if it was.

He looks up at Papa, feeling… it’s hard to say what, but he’s feeling a _lot_ of it. The whole gamut, or spectrum, or whatever, in a fast-motion flipbook. 

“I’m—” he starts, but when he opens his mouth to say more, there’s nothing there besides the nonspecific white noise of a truly colossal fuck-up. If there are prizes for this kind of thing, he thinks, he’s getting first place this time, not second. 

But Papa just smiles and sets both hands down gently on his shoulders. “Cardinal, if you’re about to apologize and tell me you’re an idiot, there’s no need. I already know.” 

Copia ducks his head, trying his best not to laugh, because there’s nothing else his body can think todo with all the adrenaline pinging giddy and wild inside him. But then Papa’s sliding his hands up higher, higher, past his shoulders and up his neck, and he forgets all about laughing. 

One gloved thumb creeps up to settle on Copia’s bottom lip, stroking his mouth open, the leather warm and smooth. Copia feels a great shiver, all the way from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet. 

“Maybe I haven’t been clear enough,” Papa admits, his thumb still rubbing slowly. The pointed tip of one golden nail pushes down, gentle but undeniably _there_ , right in the middle of his bottom lip. “I’m sorry. Let me prove it to you. No crowd this time. Just us.” 

In a dark, quiet hallway, with only the falling snow for company, Papa kisses him softly. 

With a heart full of hope, Copia kisses back. 

It shouldn’t feel like a first kiss, because it’s not. But it does. 

It’s so much better— _so_ much better than the first time. That had been a textbook Nice Kiss, with all of the technical boxes ticked. Lips parted, bodies flush, twinkling lights: the works. But this is different, because Copia knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that it’s real.

Papa angles Copia’s chin up and kisses him deeply, and it’s like everything is amplified, refracted and shot through a mirror and aimed back at him, and it’s hitting him in triplicate. Like their desire is a cell dividing, again and again, growing like an exponential curve on a graph, inching higher with every soft sound that Papa makes against him. 

Like the big, heavy door to the main abbey has been thrown open to the courtyard, but it’s only warm air rushing in. 

As Papa’s mouth parts and he feels the slick slide of his tongue, Copia has the sudden thought that he should have painted his lower lip black instead, so they could have fit together like _that_ too. Perfect halves, nestled together, with no space between them. 

Copia’s hands reach out tentatively to grab at Papa’s coat, looking for something to anchor him. He must feel Copia fumbling, because he cuts right to the chase, fisting a hand in the front of Copia’s shirt and yanking him forward, crushing them together. 

Pressed against him in the dark, tasting paint and champagne, the _wanting_ pours in. Dizzying and quick, like it’s finally been granted permission to fill a waiting vessel, and Copia can’t seem to remember what he was so worried about. 

They stay like that for a long time—long enough for the cold from the window to make Copia shiver a little. He laughs, then gasps when Papa pulls back to breathe hot against his neck. Warming him up, in his way. He kisses Copia once on each cheek, then again on his mouth, just for good measure. The paint on his mouth is smeared, the skin underneath as pink as the petal of a flower.

“My quarters,” Papa says against his mouth, breathless and wanting. “Please say yes.” 

The answer is easy. The answer is yes. 

They leave the way they came, their hands laced together tightly. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading <3


	4. IV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> check out the new rating & tags before proceeding. happy new year's eve! <3

Copia’s not sure what he expects when Papa pulls him into his quarters. Of course he’s heard stories; you can’t step foot on the abbey grounds without hearing stories. Ritual sacrifice and hot candle wax. Blood and knives and virgins. One particularly tasteless one involved a ram’s head. Copia realizes, just now, that Papa probably started that one himself. 

What he didn’t expect was Papa pressing him against the door and starting by kissing him softly—so very softly—and fitting one hand at his waist and another at his cheek, cradling him like something that could break. Something rare and fine, examined through a jeweler's loupe. 

His heart aches with the sweetness of it. All Copia can smell here is the leather of his gloves, and the humid, intimate smell of being so close to another person. 

Not just any other person. _Papa_. His head still spins a little with it as he kisses back, placing his hands gently at Papa’s waist. His lips are soft, and when Copia runs his tongue along them, they part easily. 

“So quiet, Cardinal.” Papa pulls away a little, eyes searching, looking to see if he’s done something wrong. “Please don’t tell me you’re overthinking this again. I promise there are no Sisters hiding in the closet watching.”

“I’m sorry, I’m just—” Copia laughs, feeling himself get pink along the bridge of his nose. It’s hard not to feel a little self-aware. The bright light of Papa’s attention casts him in such a sharp relief. “I’m just a little overwhelmed. I’m feeling—” He has to stop to gasp when Papa leans back in to bite his neck. “Very thoroughly romanced.”

“What were you expecting? Did you think I would fuck you on a bed of skulls?” Copia must not arrange his features in response to that very well, because Papa looks offended. “On a _first date?_ ”

“A man hears rumors.” Copia holds up his hands in protest, his heart still joyously tripping over the word _date_. He expects the banter to continue, for Papa to say _Let’s start some new ones, then_ , but his face softens, and he smiles, gathering Copia’s hands in his own, kissing them sweetly. 

“I suppose I have some work to do on my reputation,” he says, rubbing his lips along Copia’s jaw. A gloved finger brushes the topmost button of his coat, closest to Copia’s throat, and he feels goosebumps rise on his chest. “May I take this lovely waistcoat off you, Cardinal?”

“You may.”

He shrugs it off, with Papa’s help, letting him drape it over the arm of the couch. It’s dark in Papa’s quarters—neither of them has moved to turn on the lamp—but he can still see its glossy shine from the corner of his eye.

“And your gloves, Cardinal.” 

“Please.” Copia presents his hands, watching Papa pull on each finger one by one, making a show of it, until his gloves are loose enough to tug off. His hands look white and naked in dim light, cradled by Papa’s gloved ones.

Layer by layer, he slides that fine suit off Copia’s body, until only his slacks are left, and they’ve made their way to Papa’s bed with a trail of menswear in their wake. Papa presses him flat, dipping a kiss to a mole just to the left of his collarbone. Copia feels an aching fondness beneath his sternum; the feeling of having something he didn’t know he was allowed to want. 

He watches, propped on an elbow, while Papa slides himself out of his jacket, wincing a little when he lets it crumple to the floor. 

“I’m going to start a rumor that you’re careless with your nice things.” 

“Rumors have to be surprising for them to be interesting,” Papa says, smoothing back his hair. He crawls over Copia, leaning down to kiss him quiet. “I’m not careless with things I really like.”

“Oh?” 

“I intend to take very good care of you, Cardinal.” He brushes a thumb across Copia’s eyebrow, then along his sideburn. “Let me make you feel good.” Another kiss to Copia’s mouth, lush and dirty. A shiver crawls its way under his skin when Papa sucks his tongue a little before pulling back. “What do you want?”

Copia hesitates, catching his breath. Just having Papa leaning over him, smiling and warm, his hair charmingly disheveled, is enough. But if the offer’s open—well. 

He turns Papa’s words about self-indulgence over in his mind. About how allowing yourself to feel good is a skill like any other that needs work and study and practice—and a little encouragement. If the end of the year isn't a time for dipping into untapped courage to ask for what you can’t give yourself, Copia doesn't know what is.

“Were you serious,” Copia says, feeling his pulse hammering in his throat. “When you joked about… last week. When you said I needed to be tied up.” He can’t quite bring himself to phrase it as a question, so it comes out as a statement, hanging heavy in the air between them. Copia feels it couldn’t be any more conspicuous if he’d hired someone to skywrite it. 

The smile on Papa’s face spreads slow and wicked. He leans forward to suck a mark on Copia’s neck—too high to be covered by a collar—before he answers. 

“I can be serious, Cardinal.” 

***

That’s more or less how Copia ends up with his wrists lashed to Papa’s headboard. 

Papa couldn’t find anything else, so he’s held in place with two black silk ties, carefully knotted. They’ll probably never hold their shape again. Copia thanks them for their noble sacrifice, only able to resist the impulse to cross himself by the fact that his wrists are rather preoccupied. Old habits die hard.

“I _knew_ you were trying too hard to be casual when you brought this up earlier.” Papa says cheerfully, tugging the tie where it’s wrapped around Copia’s wrist. “Test it.” 

Papa’s sort of kneeling over him, still finishing up the last knot. He’s taken his shirt and gloves off, but he’s still wearing his dress slacks. Copia stares openly at his bare chest, which is youthful and strong-looking, feeling an embarrassing need to touch rising in his throat. 

Obediently, Copia strains against the ties to the extent that he can, but his arms are spread wide, just shy of uncomfortably so. Papa didn’t leave him much slack, and they don’t budge. He nods in approval at his work.

“Forgive the question, but…” Copia considers how to phrase this. “The ties. I thought you might have—”

“Something nicer? Something made for this kind of thing?” Copia nods. “I do. Or, well, I _did_. I think I left them tied around the bedposts of the visiting Archduchess last Equinox.” 

Copia rolls his eyes. “What did I just say? Careless with your nice things.” 

“Oh, shut up. I don’t see you complaining, all trussed up in black silk.”

“Where did you learn to do this, anyway?” Copia asks, opening and closing his hands experimentally.

Papa laughs, rummaging for something in the bedside drawer. “Not the Boy Scouts, if that’s what you’re thinking.” 

“I thought maybe something nautical. I could see you at a ship’s wheel.” 

“Ha! Only with a drink in my hand.” Papa sets something Copia can’t see on the bedside next to him. “Cardinal, you’re talking about ships because you’re nervous.” 

“Is it so obvious?”

“Yes. But don't worry, it’s very charming.”

Copia turns his face into his arm to hide his smile, because when he permitted himself to imagine this—whatever _this_ is—he wasn’t sure if they’d talk like this. How they always do, trading banter and insults in a lazy sort of way. Second nature, like an inhale following an exhale.

Everything’s the same. Except, of course, for the fact that he’s mostly naked, peppered in hickeys, and affixed to the posts of Papa’s headboard, feeling like a virgin on an altar. 

His mind wanders to the altar in the main chapel, and how it would feel to be draped over it with Papa above him, hooking a leg over his shoulder, pulling up his chasuble to reveal nothing underneath. Now _there’s_ a thought. He feels a sense of vertigo, like a box of fantasies he never dared to entertain has just been upended right on top of him. 

“Copia,” Papa says, low and gentle, bringing him back to the here and now. “I won’t hurt you.”

Copia smiles, a little admonished, like he’s been caught doing something foolish. “I know.” 

“Not unless you asked, of course. And then only as much as you wanted me to, and with great enthusiasm.” 

Copia laughs, then winces when his arms pull a little. “Is there anything you _don’t_ do with great enthusiasm?” 

“Absolutely not. There’s no other way to live,” Papa says quite seriously, pressing a kiss to Copia’s forehead. “And now you’ll have first-hand experience. How wonderful for all those charts and graphs in your head.” 

Copia’s about to say something clever, but then Papa’s moving down on the bed, sliding a hand under Copia’s flank to help him lift his hips, and whatever he was going to say disappears like the fizzing _pop_ of a light bulb suddenly going out. Papa slides his briefs down, pulling them off in one smooth motion, until the cool air of the room is touching him everywhere. 

“Look at you,” Papa breathes. He’s sitting back on his knees, appraising, wolfish in that way he gets when he really wants something. “Is that for me?”

Copia’s half-hard already, just from the anticipation and from being kissed. He’s not dripping on his belly yet, but he will be soon if Papa keeps looking at him like that.

“Just thinking about your self-proclaimed enthusiasm,” Copia laughs, watching Papa press a kiss to the inside of his thigh. 

“I should really show and not tell,” Papa muses, and then—there’s really no other word for it—he _nuzzles_ into Copia’s groin, shameless and animal, breathing him in. A bare hand circles the base of his dick while he kisses Copia’s thighs, the soft crook of his leg. He keeps inching up, pressing his lips higher and higher up Copia’s body, until he reaches the tip of his cock, his mouth dragging wetly as it lingers there.

“Oh,” Copia says, just a syllable, because he finds he has nothing else to say. In a flash, he’s all-the-way hard, twisting in the ties like the sail of a ship, curling his toes in the bedsheets when Papa starts moving his hand. It’s light, just the scaffolding of a real touch, but he’s worked up enough that it’s got his blood moving quick and hot.

“You like that,” Papa says, a statement and not a question, because he already knows the answer. He leans down suddenly and licks him base to tip, all in one quick motion, then sucks the head of his cock into his mouth before Copia can react. 

“ _Christ_.”

Papa laughs with his mouth full. 

“He's not here, Cardinal." His mouth slides its way back along the side of Copia’s cock. His tongue makes a brief but noteworthy appearance. “Though you make a convincing pantomime.”

Copia’s only just starting to feel the strain, but it gets a little worse when he tries to chase Papa’s mouth. “I- _ah._ I think he probably suffered more.”

“Is that a challenge? Do you want to suffer?” Papa’s eyes are wicked as he carefully fits his bare teeth against the skin of Copia’s inner thigh. Not biting, just a dangerous little reminder that he could, if Copia wanted him to. 

Copia’s pulse hits the ceiling at the same time that he laughs. “Not any more than I already am. Please.” 

“Another time, then.”

“Sure, yes.” Copia flexes his thighs to try to reach Papa’s mouth, making his shoulders and arms ache without having anything to show for it. This is the point of it, he knows on some level—this frantic movement from one touch to the next, never long enough to really satisfy. 

Papa pulls back, pretending to stretch. “You’re a bad conversation partner when you’re distracted, you know.” 

Copia lets his head thunk against the headboard, exasperated. “You’ll forgive me for not trying to entertain you right now.” 

“Don’t worry about me, Cardinal. This is about you.” Papa settles back in, flicking out his tongue to lick the damp tip of his cock. The sound Copia makes is gasping, choked—more at the sight than the sensation, because he barely has time to register the feeling before Papa’s tongue darts back into his mouth. “And I’m very entertained.” 

His eyes flick to Copia’s. They stay there as he takes him fully into his mouth, all the way to the hilt.

Copia moans, surprising himself at the force of his reaction, but maybe he’d be forgiven for having his shyness stripped down to the studs after the kind of night he’s had. His thighs go tight as his body takes the wheel, hips pressing further into the tight, wet warmth of Papa's mouth.

“Cardinal,” Papa says, a little thickly, pressing a palm flat against his hip bone. Copia stills like a rabbit caught in a crosshair. “Don’t move your hips until I tell you otherwise. Please.” 

Copia pauses, feeling the vertigo of his box of overturned fantasies again. All that sensation and want, that cavernous aperture of newfound desire, tightened to a pinprick. Only what Papa can give him. 

“I won’t,” he says, nerves sparking. “I’ll wait for your word."

“Oh, _now_ he trusts my word,” Papa grouses, but he’s already settling back down on the bed, propped up on his elbows. He slips his hands under Copia’s ass, squeezing for good measure, nudging his legs to bend up, up, up, until there’s space for him in between. The intentional discomfort _pulls_ at him, at his wrists and between his legs. 

“Look at you,” Papa says fondly. “Trying _so_ hard to be polite when I’m teasing you so much. Maybe I should make it a little harder.” 

He takes him again, all the way down, until his nose is pressed against Copia’s belly, then slides back up the way he came. Does it again, tongue lathing.

It is with incredible effort that Copia does not thrust up right then. He pants, quick and sharp, observing the shape Papa’s jaw takes when his mouth is full with something like awe. 

“Do you remember what I told you,” Papa says, a minute or two later, lips glistening with slick and spit, “about a gift from someone else being easier to accept than something you give yourself?”

“Yes,” Copia says, because that’s about all he can manage right now, watching Papa rub the head of his dick on his lips. They’re entirely pink now, no paint left. 

“Sometimes, gifts come with strings attached. But that just makes it sweeter when you can finally enjoy them.” He pulses his hand, a tight little circle, all the way up to the tip of his dick, then releases him. They watch the precome dribble out together. “Right now, I bet you wish you could move me. Fuck my mouth. Make me choke on it. You could probably do it, even restrained. But you won’t, will you?” 

Copia just groans, because what do you even _say_ to that? Papa’s operating at a baseline of dirty talk that could level a city block. His cock is so hard that it’s lying flat on his belly, pink and shining wet at the tip. He’s never wanted to touch himself so badly in his life.

"No, you won't.” Papa agrees, like he never expected a real answer anyway. “Very good, Cardinal."

Papa stops then, his fist tucked under his chin, just looking at him. At first Copia thinks this is part of it—some new level of torture, like maybe the endgame of all this is Papa trying to make him come with just his brain. But his face looks so _soft_ and earnest and happy that Copia knows it has to be something else.

“You are _so_ lovely,” Papa says, and it’s full of so much affection that Copia has to squeeze his eyes closed, because his eyelashes feel mysteriously wet. Papa reaches forward to rub Copia’s thigh with one soft hand. A prince’s hands, Copia thinks. No calluses. “Even lovelier than I imagined. Your face when I touch you, knowing you can’t touch back...” His hand returns to Copia’s cock, stroking him slowly and steadily, rubbing his thumb through the slickness at the tip. Copia arches, wordlessly, feeling strung tight from his shoulders to his feet. 

“Just like that,” Papa licks his wet fingers. “I’d like to pray at your altar.” 

“Sort of blasphemous,” Copia gets out through gritted teeth, trying desperately to fight his hips from snapping up into Papa’s hand. It’s a very near thing. “Don’t you think?”

“No,” Papa says simply, finally sliding off his belt and tugging off his slacks. No underwear, which is the least surprising thing that’s happened all night, but Copia’s pulse still pounds in his throat at the sight of him. Tan and muscular, bare at last. “The divine is all around us. I know it when I see it.”

He gets himself ready quietly, thighs spread wide over Copia’s chest, his cock beautiful and flushed and revealing more about the state of his composure than his casual attitude would have Copia believe. 

And Copia can’t do anything but look. He watches the wet shine of Papa’s fingers disappear inside him, first one and then two; accommodating, making room for him. He thinks about how deliberate this act is, how Papa is showing _and_ telling him, and feels warm all the way to his toes. 

“Remember, Cardinal,” Papa says. There’s color creeping its way up his neck, matching the dark flush between his legs. “Don’t move until I tell you.”

When he guides Copia inside, right into the slick heat of him, and sinks down slowly with a hand gripping the meat of Copia’s shoulder for balance, it feels like the final piece in a complicated puzzle. Like there should be an audible _click_ in Copia’s heart with how _right_ and how inevitable it feels, like all the gears of something big and complex are aligned at last, and all it took was a little push. 

Papa exhales, laughing shakily when they’re finally flush. 

“Oh, _there_ you are, Cardinal,” he says, rolling his neck, stretching. _Getting used to me_ , Copia thinks, feeling his cock jump where it’s seated tight inside him. He wants to laugh, to say something funny, but when he opens his mouth, there’s only earnestness left. 

“I want to touch you,” he says, desperate, wrists aching with how much he’s pulling now. He regrets every moment this evening he didn’t spend with his hand against Papa’s bare skin. He would have stuck his hand down his shirt in front of God and everyone on the dance floor if he knew how deprived he was going to be later. 

“Tell me how,” Papa moans, starting to rock his hips a little more purposefully now. Not riding him, not quite—just these little shifting half-movements, seating and re-seating himself on Copia’s cock by centimeters, again and again. “If you could. Tell me how you would touch me.” 

Copia looks at the thick curve of his thighs, spread wide and warm around his waist; the line of his neck when he tips it back to start up a rhythm in earnest; the dark, sparse hair on his legs, and what lies between them. The answer is _everywhere_ , with care and purpose, until nothing is left unknown about Papa’s body, but he has to start somewhere.

“I’d…I’d hold you by your hips. Like when we were dancing, but more.” He wants it so badly he can see it in his mind’s eye, a picture-in-picture overlay. His gloved hand, curved over Papa’s bare hip like they were chiseled out of the same block of marble. A perfect fit. 

Papa’s grip on his shoulders tightens. “What else?” 

“Your ass.” It’s not world-class dirty talk, but it’s honest and true, and that feels more important. 

“It’s a very nice ass,” Papa agrees with a laugh. He pants, his thighs trembling with exertion as he moves quicker, more intentionally. “Keep going.”

Copia’s sweating now, arms straining, cock straining—everything straining, desperate to move. “I’d push you off me,” he grits out. “Flip you on your belly, on- _ah_!” He gasps when Papa grinds down hard. “On all fours.” 

Papa swears, rolling his hips faster. 

“Tomorrow,” Papa says, sliding a hand down to start stroking himself, like he can’t bear to wait any longer. “Do it like that. I want you to.”

Copia’s gasping now; making sounds he can’t seem to stop, because the tight squeeze around him is both overwhelming and not enough. He’s hovering right on the edge of release, wrists aching, and he’s pulling hard enough that even the tamped-down anxious part of him is reemerging enough to start worrying about the structural integrity of the bedposts.

“Please, I can’t- I can’t not move,” he babbles, squeezing his eyes shut, fisting his hands in their restraints, feeling the uncontrollable roll of his hips starting in his groin, deep and inevitable as a wave. “Please, can I— _”_

“Copia,” Papa says tightly. His hair’s fallen in front of his eyes. “Move your hips. Now.”

Copia does, swearing, pulsing up to meet him halfway. He does it again, and again, and again, watching Papa’s face go slack every time they fit together. The angle’s not the best; it’s hard to set a rhythm when you can’t use your arms, but it doesn’t take much more. There’s a sharp prick of pain in his shoulder—Papa, gripping him tight enough for his nails to sting—and then he feels the spring that had been coiling tight and tighter in him all night suddenly go loose. 

Papa watches Copia’s face when he comes, staring openly and with something like hunger. His own hand keeps moving until Copia feels the hot drip of his release on his chest. 

When he slumps forward, kissing Copia sloppily, petting his hair, Copia hears him say: _Yes, yes, yes_ , repeated like a prayer. Copia sings it back with his heart as best he can: Yes to everything, always. He’s never saying no again. 

As soon as his wrists are freed, he wraps himself around Papa and doesn’t let go.

***

Papa had cleaned off both their paint with a damp handkerchief afterwards, dabbing carefully at the gentle skin around Copia’s eyes. Copia had felt so achingly and tenderly cared for that he felt like he needed to say something, but he couldn’t figure out what. 

“Just so we’re clear, this is _romantic_ face-washing,” Papa had said, completely ruining the moment. “In case that brain of yours is trying to figure out how to overthink this.”

Neither of them had thought to pull the curtains closed. 

Copia wakes the next day to the slanting gray light of mid-morning, blinking awake all at once, startled by sunlight and unfamiliar surroundings. He lies there for a moment, perfectly still, letting the memories of the night before wash over him slowly, wonderfully, until he’s caught back up to speed. He presses a kiss to the top of Papa’s head, careful not to wake him up. 

As quietly as he can, he slips out of bed, rummaging around in Papa’s dresser until he finds a clean pair of boxers. He carefully bundles last night’s clothes into a spare dry cleaning bag in Papa’s closet, mentally apologizing to each of them for their mistreatment. Revelations and newfound zest for life aside, he can't _not_ be Copia sometimes. 

He holds the purple waistcoat the longest. It’s brighter in the morning light—softer, somehow. 

Snow fell heavy and thick and silent while they slept, and now the abbey grounds are blanketed with it. It stretches white and pristine all the way to the blackness of the lake and beyond. Apparently, winter got the message that it was being celebrated and offered itself up in even greater abundance. 

When Copia looks out the living room window, drawing a blanket around his shoulders against the cold, he doesn’t even see any groundskeeping ghouls milling about. It seems everyone’s taken the morning off. 

He wonders if anyone noticed them leave early, and finds he doesn’t care about the answer.

He flicks on the heat, leaning against the doorframe as he stares at Papa's sleeping face, bare and soft and content. _I put that expression there_ , he thinks. His heart feels as still and calm and the snow outside. 

***

Copia waits as long as he can before waking Papa up, until he’s so hungry he can’t stand it. He makes breakfast with what Papa has in his fridge; coffee and eggs and bacon, with toast on the side. Papa sleeps straight through the clattering of pots and pans, but it’s the smell of crackling fat on the stove that finally rouses him. He slinks behind Copia soundlessly and sleepily, smelling like toothpaste and the specter of last night's cologne.

“Early for breakfast,” he says groggily, resting his chin on Copia's shoulder, dropping a kiss to his cheek. 

“It's _eleven o'clock_. You’re just nocturnal.”

Copia expects a reply, but Papa just reaches forward to pluck a piece of toast from the toaster and eats it wordlessly, crunching loudly in Copia’s ear. He leans on Copia for support, like the effort of being awake and eating carbs before noon is physically impossible without assistance. _Finally_ , Copia thinks. _The Terzo antidote: Morning._

“You’re cute like this, all domestic.” 

“Mmm,” Papa says around a mouthful of toast, nuzzling his face against Copia’s neck, pleased. “The Emeritus curse of desire takes many forms.”

The nuzzling turns into kisses, then a love bite, then a hand slipped down his boxers. 

“Breakfast,” Copia protests weakly, but his body betrays him, his hips already rocking into Papa’s hand.

The bacon burns, and they use up the hot water together. 

“I want you again,” Papa says later against his damp cheek, his hand working over Copia’s cock. The shower went tepid fifteen minutes ago, but Copia feels warm and wet all over, every inch of him fogged up with want. Papa rubs himself against Copia’s leg, hot and hard and slick, even in the water. “Please. Can you feel how much?”

Copia takes him at his word this time. He fucks him again on the unmade bed, quickly, before their damp skin from the shower turns cold. When he presses his thumb into the place he knows will open for him, when Papa inhales sharply and his eyes flutter closed, when he says _Copia_ like it’s something holy, he knows he’ll never be uncertain again. Not about this.

Copia wraps an arm around Papa’s chest as he drapes his body over his, pressing into him slow and deep, touching him everywhere, wondering if it’s possible to pour love into someone like this. From your body to theirs, like a river to the sea. 

***

“You know,” Papa says, a little drowsily from where his head is resting on Copia’s shoulder. One bare hand fusses with the sparse patch of hair on Copia’s chest. It feels nice. “I didn’t figure you’d play so hard to get. I guess I'll make sure to notarize all my invitations in the future.” 

Copia laughs, rubbing stray sleep out of his eyes. “I know we’re just doing the flirty banter thing again, but did you know Cumulus is actually a notary? I helped her fill out the application last year.” He brushes a stray thread from something-or-other from Papa’s hair. It’s hard to tell what it’s from when everything is black.

He can feel Papa laugh against his chest. “Of course you did. It’s decided. She’ll be our official chaperone next time to make sure everything’s above board.”

“Next time.” Copia repeats softly, smoothing down Papa’s hair so it lies flat and smooth against his neck. “Will there be a next time?”

There is a heavy beat, and then Papa sits up abruptly and stares at him. The sheet slips down around him, revealing the curve of a slim hip. “Are you _serious_?”

Copia opens his mouth to answer, but Papa’s already pushing ahead, incredulous. 

“Cardinal, you are infuriating. One misunderstanding, I can forgive. But I am not sure how much more explicit I need to be.” He holds up a hand and starts counting on his fingers with increasing agitation. “First, I invite you to a party, _which you misinterpret as a joke through no fault of my own_.” He jabs a finger at Copia, who closes his mouth obediently. “Then I send you a suit in a box with a ribbon. I kiss you in a ballroom full of candles. I sacrifice two perfectly good silk ties to suck your cock. Do I need to continue?” 

He pauses for a moment, eyes narrowing as Copia struggles to keep a straight face. “You’re making fun of me.”

“Just a little. And I’m sorry about the ties.”

Papa rolls his eyes, pressing a kiss to Copia’s stomach before settling back down and letting his hair be stroked again. 

“I’d ruin a thousand ties to reassure you, Cardinal.” He says drowsily, on the end of a yawn. “I’d build a pyre and dance naked in front of them, if that’s what you wanted.” 

Now, that’s a mental image. “What an interesting offer. I’ll have to consider that.”

Papa laughs sleepily, already fading away. “Ask me again later. Let’s go back to sleep. Sex and feelings are ehxausting.” 

Copia can’t argue with that. He falls asleep with Papa's head on his chest and a heart full of tenderness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had _the_ most fun writing this. i'm sorry to see it go so quick, but it just felt fitting to get it all posted before the new year. thank you so much for reading and for the encouraging comments & kudos! i love this fandom.
> 
> to a 2021 full of ghost 🥂


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